Director, Data Science, Foundation Model AI 

Job Description

Our Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning (AI/ML) capabilities are critical accelerators of our mission to invent new medicines that save and improve lives. Core to the Data, AI, and Genome Sciences (DAGS) function is an AI/ML-first approach to improving target and biomarker discovery, validation, and selection, and elucidating complex disease mechanisms. As Director of foundational AI, you will be responsible for leading a team of machine learning researchers and engineers, overseeing both large foundation model development and the development of bespoke methods for extracting insights from noisy biological data. Your work will advance our understanding of complex diseases and support the development of innovative therapeutic strategies. In this pursuit, you will have at your disposal high-performance clusters with several hundred state-of-the-art GPUs, access to biological, computational, and engineering experts from across our company and external vendors, and a team of exceptional machine learning researchers. You will be part of a broader, cross-functional team of computational biologists, data scientists, software engineers, and machine learning researchers who strive to identify therapeutic targets and biomarkers.

Primary Responsibilities

• Collaborate with cross-functional teams to identify research questions of high impact.

• Align and prioritize the group’s research and development work with our company business needs.

• Articulate the group’s agenda and demonstrate delivered business value to diverse stakeholders.

• Provide deep technical guidance. Oversee the training of large multi-modal foundation models. Work with data, including various omics, imaging, and text modalities.

• Interpret and critically analyze results from machine learning and AI models.

• Cultivate and champion a culture of AI excellence within DAGS and across our company

• Coach and advance the team of machine learning researchers.

• Stay current with AI, machine learning, and statistics. Proactively propose and pilot promising research directions.

• Publish research findings in relevant conferences and journals and actively contribute to the scientific community through knowledge sharing and collaborations.

• Establish and nurture existing collaborations with academia and industry.

Required Education, Experience, And Skills

• PhD in Computer Science, Statistics, Physics, Engineering, Mathematics, Data Science, AI/Machine Learning, Computational Biology, Bioinformatics, Computational Biology, or related STEM field and 7+ years of full-time experience or an MS and 10+ years of experience.

• Deep technical expertise in classical machine learning, including probabilistic models and causal analysis. Demonstrated world-class expertise in at least one sub-area of machine learning or AI, as shown by publications in NeurIPS, ICML, ICLR, AISTATS, or equivalent venues, and/or open-source projects.

• Experience leading teams of machine learning researchers and software engineers.

• Experience training large models on multi-node, multi-GPU environments.

• Experience designing novel architectures for multi-modal foundation models.

• Experience in post-training foundation models, including familiarity with parameter-efficient fine-tuning, post-hoc interpretability, and preference optimization.

• Strong proficiency in Python and awareness of software engineering best practices.

• Experience with standard deep learning frameworks like the PyTorch ecosystem.

• Excellent communication skills and ability to work collaboratively in a multi-disciplinary team.

• Interest in life sciences problems and disease biology, and willing to learn from and teach others.

Preferred Skills and Experience

• Experience training and working with large transformer-based models is strongly preferred.

• Experience with modern generative modeling paradigms, such as diffusion modeling and flow matching.

• Experience or interest in reinforcement learning (RL) and using RL for training reasoning models.

• Familiarity and prior experience with biological data and biological foundation models are strong pluses.

• Relevant publications in scientific journals and experience contributing to research communities, including NeurIPS, ICML, ICLR, etc.

#EligibleforERP

Required Skills:

AI Architecture, Artificial Intelligence (AI), Computer Science, Data Engineering, Data Science, Foundation Model Fine Tuning, Foundation Models, Generative AI, Genomics, Machine Learning (ML), Python (Programming Language), PyTorch, Software Development, Transformer Model

Preferred Skills:

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Current Contingent Workers apply HERE

US and Puerto Rico Residents Only:

Our company is committed to inclusion, ensuring that candidates can engage in a hiring process that exhibits their true capabilities. Please click here if you need an accommodation during the application or hiring process.

As an Equal Employment Opportunity Employer, we provide equal opportunities to all employees and applicants for employment and prohibit discrimination on the basis of race, color, age, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, protected veteran status, disability status, or other applicable legally protected characteristics. As a federal contractor, we comply with all affirmative action requirements for protected veterans and individuals with disabilities. For more information about personal rights under the U.S. Equal Opportunity Employment laws, visit:

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We are proud to be a company that embraces the value of bringing together, talented, and committed people with diverse experiences, perspectives, skills and backgrounds. The fastest way to breakthrough innovation is when people with diverse ideas, broad experiences, backgrounds, and skills come together in an inclusive environment. We encourage our colleagues to respectfully challenge one another’s thinking and approach problems collectively.

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The salary range for this role is

$194,100.00 - $305,600.00

This is the lowest to highest salary we in good faith believe we would pay for this role at the time of this posting. An employee’s position within the salary range will be based on several factors including, but not limited to relevant education, qualifications, certifications, experience, skills, geographic location, government requirements, and business or organizational needs.

The successful candidate will be eligible for annual bonus and long-term incentive, if applicable.

We offer a comprehensive package of benefits. Available benefits include medical, dental, vision healthcare and other insurance benefits (for employee and family), retirement benefits, including 401(k), paid holidays, vacation, and compassionate and sick days. More information about benefits is available at https://jobs.merck.com/us/en/compensation-and-benefits.

You can apply for this role through https://jobs.merck.com/us/en (or via the Workday Jobs Hub if you are a current employee). The application deadline for this position is stated on this posting.

San Francisco Residents Only: We will consider qualified applicants with arrest and conviction records for employment in compliance with the San Francisco Fair Chance Ordinance

Los Angeles Residents Only: We will consider for employment all qualified applicants, including those with criminal histories, in a manner consistent with the requirements of applicable state and local laws, including the City of Los Angeles’ Fair Chance Initiative for Hiring Ordinance

Search Firm Representatives Please Read Carefully
Merck & Co., Inc., Rahway, NJ, USA, also known as Merck Sharp & Dohme LLC, Rahway, NJ, USA, does not accept unsolicited assistance from search firms for employment opportunities. All CVs / resumes submitted by search firms to any employee at our company without a valid written search agreement in place for this position will be deemed the sole property of our company. No fee will be paid in the event a candidate is hired by our company as a result of an agency referral where no pre-existing agreement is in place. Where agency agreements are in place, introductions are position specific. Please, no phone calls or emails.

Employee Status:

Regular

Relocation:

Domestic

VISA Sponsorship:

Yes

Travel Requirements:

10%

Flexible Work Arrangements:

Hybrid

Shift:

Not Indicated

Valid Driving License:

No

Hazardous Material(s):

n/a

Job Posting End Date:

06/12/2026

*A job posting is effective until 11:59:59PM on the day BEFORE the listed job posting end date. Please ensure you apply to a job posting no later than the day BEFORE the job posting end date.